


An Easy Choice

by Mayarene Rose (Paradise_of_Mary_Jane)



Series: Whumptober 2019 [9]
Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Friendship, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-09
Updated: 2019-10-09
Packaged: 2020-12-01 22:27:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,583
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20918771
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Paradise_of_Mary_Jane/pseuds/Mayarene%20Rose
Summary: He’s thinner than Arthur remembers, and paler, too. His eyes are a dull blue. Just blue, while his shackles glow gold.Merlin didn’t return to Camelot. He was captured and dragged back to a city that was more than eager to kill him.





	An Easy Choice

**Author's Note:**

> Day 9: Shackled

Merlin returns to Camelot after a year, hands shackled, and swaying on his feet. 

Return isn’t really the correct way of saying it. Return would imply he came back of his own free will. No, Merlin didn’t return. Returning was probably the last thing Merlin wanted to do. Merlin had been terrified when he ran away. There was no way he would have willingly come back. Not with the bounty on his head. The man might have poor self-preservation instincts, but he never actively sought death.

Merlin didn’t return to Camelot. He was captured and dragged back to a city that was more than eager to kill him.

He’s thinner than Arthur remembers, and paler, too. His eyes are a dull blue. Just blue, while his shackles glow gold.

Arthur thinks he’s going to be sick.

Merlin’s captor pushes him to his knees. Merlin stumbles and falls forward. The court is silent. They recognize him, both from his time in the royal household and his one final act of magic that caused him to flee. Many had been fond of him. Merlin hadn’t been in Camelot for long but he’d been likeable. He had many friends among the servants and knights, and even some amongst the courtiers.

No one is going to speak up for him, either, Arthur realizes. They’re looking at him differently now. Like a traitor. They don’t think his life is worth anything anymore. 

“You’ve found the sorcerer,” he hears his father say. His ears are ringing. He can’t bring himself to look away from Merlin. Merlin’s gaze is sharp, trained on him, pinning him to where he is. Arthur wants to charge straight at him, tear through that man holding him prisoner, and take him. Save him. 

Merlin stops him with a slight shake of his head.

“Aye sire,” the man says. A soldier. One of the ones his father sent out to capture Merlin. “Wasn’t even trying to run. Just sitting there. Waiting.”

Arthur barely stops his mouth from falling open. That doesn’t make sense. Merlin had been terrified. He was desperate. He fled. 

Arthur saw him crossing the city’s borders. Merlin rode like an animal hunted. He wouldn’t have come back. 

Not willingly.

“Take him to the dungeons,” his father says. “Tomorrow we shall build his pyre.”

Merlin is still looking at Arthur and Arthur can’t make himself look away. Merlin is trying to tell him something but he doesn’t know what.

“Is there anything you’d like to add, Arthur?” His father’s question is pointed. A test of his loyalty. He’s been getting a lot of that lately, ever since…

Arthur never cared enough to play along. It’s only a matter of time before his father’s patience falters, but Arthur can’t bring himself to care, either. His father betrayed him first, betrayed his crown, had hunted down a loyal servant because of his own fear.. Arthur cannot forgive that.

But there’s a silent plea in Merlin’s gaze and Arthur might not understand it completely, but he won’t betray it.

So he says, “Nothing,” and leaves it at that.

\--

Past midnight, when the castle is quiet and most servants are safely in their beds, Arthur sneaks into the dungeon. Sir Leon helps him without question, which Arthur is grateful for. They don’t speak about it. It’s better that way.

They both cared for Merlin, in their own ways. There’s nothing to be said apart from that.

The dungeons are empty, when they get there. Arthur doesn’t question it.

Merlin sits on one of the cells, knees drawn to his chest, head buried in his arms. The shackles around his hands still glow a bright, blinding gold. He doesn’t seem to be sleeping but he doesn’t seem to have noticed them, either.

“I’ll give you two some privacy,” Leon says. “Just don’t take too long. He won’t be left unguarded for long.”

“Thank you, Leon,” Arthur says.

Leon nods. He leaves.

Merlin looks up as Arthur approaches. He doesn’t try to open the door, though he supposes he could. Maybe he will. Merlin doesn’t look like he’s in a fit state to run right now. Under the harsh torchlight, his skin looks papery and waxy. He eyes are so dull. He doesn’t quite look awake.

“Arthur,” Merlin sas. His voice is hoarse, like he’d been screaming. Now that Arthur is closer, he sees scars peppered across his skin. His clothes are torn and there are patches of dried blood on it.

“Merlin,” he says. “Why did you come back here?”

Merlin’s eyes crinkles at the corners. He laughs. It comes out bitter and humorless. His face is a mockery of what Merlin could have looked like in happiness.

“I had no choice,” he says. “He had bound me. He threatened a village. I couldn’t escape and running would have just hurt more people.”

“You can run now,” Arthur says. “I can get you out of here again.”

Merlin snorts. He curls tighter in on himself. “And then what?” he asks. “I get captured again? I run for the rest of my life. I go somewhere worse? What will I do after I leave Camelot, Arthur?”

“Merlin…” He’s never heard such bitterness in Merlin’s voice. It makes him sound unrecognizable. “Merlin you can come back. When I’m king--”

“I’m tired, Arthur,” Merlin says. “I’m tired of running.”

Arthur feels a lump grow in his throat. That almost sounds like… It sounds like Merlin is willing to--But no. That can’t happen. He won’t allow it. 

Merlin cannot die.

“It’s these damn things, you know?” Merlin gestures at the shackles. It seems he’s still able to read Arthur’s thoughts. “They lock my magic away somewhere I can’t reach. I’ve never felt powerless before, even with the laws. It’s only when he locked me in these things I realized, even with all the magic in the world, there’s no defeating a world that wants to kill me.”

“Merlin why are you saying such things,” Arthur says.

“Because I’m going to die tomorrow,” Merlin says. He says this frankly, without hesitation. His voice is nothing but resigned.

“What happened to you?” Arthur demands. “The Merlin I know would never have given up so easily.”

“Maybe not,” Merlin says. “But there’s nothing to be done, is there? The Merlin you knew never felt this helpless, either. And without my magic. I’d rather be dead.”

The shackles glow gold. Gold like Merlin’s eyes had been, and just as bright. Growing brighter with each moment. It seems to sap the life out of Merlin. Blooming with more color as color drains out of Merlin’s face.

Merlin looks grey and dull. He seems dead already.

Arthur lets out a shuddering breath. He allows himself one moment of weakness. Then, no more. He stands up and unlocks the door. Leon had slipped him the key. Now, Arthur is using it, consequences be damned.

“Get up, Merlin,” he says. “Get up and get out of here.”

Merlin, the stubborn fool, doesn’t get up.

“I told you, Arthur--” Merlin says. Arthur cuts him off.

“I don’t care,” Arthur says. “You’re not dying here tomorrow. You’re not dying anytime soon. And if it means that I have to drag you myself out of here, then so be it.”

He doesn’t wait for Merlin to stand up, just grabs him by the arm and lifts him to his feet. Merlin follows like a ragdoll. He’s staring at Arthur with wide eyes. It’s the first proper emotion Arthur’s seen him make. Something like confusion, something like dawning realization.

“Why are you doing this?” Merlin asks.

Why? Arthur doesn’t know, either. The first time had been an impulse. Merlin had looked desperate. Merlin had looked terrified. Arthur hadn’t known Merlin long, but he had known him well enough to know that he was no villain.

Now. Now, Merlin is back and there’s no light in his eyes. Arthur can’t stand it. He will not stand for it.

“Because you never did anything wrong,” Arthur says. “And you certainly don’t deserve to die. Now get up.”

Merlin stands, of his own two feet.

“How do I get you out of those?” Arthur gestures towards the shackles. Merlin shakes his head.

“You can’t,” he says. “Not without the key or magic, and that soldier threw the key in the river the moment he caught me. Seemed to think I’d manage to steal it from him, somehow.”

“Then how…”

“I’ll go to the Druids,” Merlin says. “They probably know how.”

It sounds reasonable enough. Except Merlin’s voice is still echoing in Arthur’s mind, _Without my magic, I’d rather be dead. _He thinks of Merlin navigating the forest on his own, hands shackled, magic bound. It makes him sick.

“I’m coming with you,” Arthur says.

“Arthur--”

“Don’t complain,” Arthur says. “You’re going to get yourself killed here.”

“You’re needed here, Arthur,” Merlin says softly.

“There are other people who need me,” Arthur says. Camelot’s court doesn’t need him. They already have a king they’re happy to follow without question. Merlin isn’t the only one running. He isn’t the only one who stands on death’s doorstep with each breath. Arthur reckons those people need him more.

Merlin looks at him as if he’d never seen him.

“What?” Arthur says.

“Nothing,” Merlin says, looking away. “You’re just not what I expected.”

Arthur’s heart is pounding in his chest. He isn’t what he expected, either. He just hopes to god that’s a good thing.

“Come,” Arthur says. “We have to go.”

**Author's Note:**

> I'm acediscowlng on tumblr :D


End file.
